:: Travel

Lively Liverpool

By Rupali Dean

Definitely the most diverse city in the world and I feel the best kept secret in the UK at the moment, though it sure has its ticket to ride after the city became the European capital of culture for 2008.

The Beatles Story museum is located just outside the main entrance to the Albert Dock and as I walked through I thought it was simply amazing and a very nice comprehensive summary of the legendary careers of the Fab Four. Witness the full-size replicas of the legendary Cavern club and also the Casbah room built in the basement of a parent’s house.

As I progressed through the exhibition there was all the information and memorabilia any Beatles fan could ever dream of. Then I hopped on to the magical mystery tour bus, which visits the boyhood homes of the Fab Four. The bus passes by their schools, the parish hall where John and Paul first met, the gateway to Strawberry field and Penny lane itself. The tour came to an end at Matthew Street.

I am not quite a late night person, but Liverpool changed me. It has a nightlife to suit everyone, for those who prefer a quieter time there are a multitude of bars and cosy restaurants. Concert square and Mathew Street are lively and bustling with many bars to choose from, or you could spend the night trying lots of them.

Of course, there is always the legendary Cavern Club if you are looking for memorable nightlife in Liverpool, the UK’s city of culture. It was first open in 1957. The front stage of the club is set under the famous arches that have provided the iconic images of the Beatles in the early 1960’s. This doesn’t mean that the club is old fashioned, it is really classy.

I hadn’t had enough of Albert Dock so I visited the Merseyside Maritime museum, also home to the International slavery museum. With this free exploring I gained an appreciation of the importance of Liverpool as a sea-faring city. The Titanic and her sister ships were fitted out here prior to sailing out to their eventual doom, and it was the major city in England for voyages to the New World for close to 200 years. It has only been since the 1960’s that Southampton has eclipsed Liverpool as a sea-faring city, but the magnificent history of the city and the superb refurbishment of Albert Dock, along with the massive construction boom coming from being the capital of European culture mean Liverpool is striding confidently into the future.

Football is like a religion in Liverpool, make no mistake about it, and should you be stuck for words or conversation in this city, then just ask them which team they support. As a matter of fact, in the Springwood cemetery there are thousands of graves with several tombstones that have the Liverpool football club emblem engraved onto them. For me it has been a fantastic experience visiting Liverpool, and as the Fab Four once sang, come and experience Liverpool where, basically all of you should be here now.

The writer is a travel expert